


The Long, Dark Storm

by idrilsdarkwritings (idrilhadhafang)



Category: Star Wars Sequel Trilogy
Genre: Abusive Snoke, Alternate Universe - Modern Setting, Background Leia/Snoke, Dark, Domestic Violence Outside Darkpilot, Endgame Darkpilot, Evil Snoke, Implied/Referenced Character Death, Like Pretty Fucking Evil, M/M, Past Character Death, Past Leia Organa/Han Solo, Stepfather Snoke
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2019-10-03
Updated: 2019-10-03
Packaged: 2020-11-22 22:29:53
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Major Character Death
Chapters: 1
Words: 728
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/20881718
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/idrilhadhafang/pseuds/idrilsdarkwritings
Summary: In which Ben is stuck with an abusive stepfather, and Poe may be one of his last chances.





	The Long, Dark Storm

**Author's Note:**

> Disclaimer: I own nothing.

Ben was only nine when he learned about his father’s death. Even sitting in the car on the ride home, his mother trying to explain things to him (that there’d been a car accident, that it had effectively killed Han), all that Ben could really understand was that Daddy just wasn’t here anymore. There was a sudden void, a place where Han Solo should have been that just simply wasn’t there anymore. 

It wasn’t fair. It wasn’t right. Daddy was supposed to be there. Untouchable, all but invincible. He wasn’t supposed to be dead. It wasn’t supposed to work like that. 

***

The funeral didn’t do him justice, Ben thought. Even with so many of his father’s friends being there — including Aunt Enfys, as well as Aunt Qi’ra — even with the eulogy being read for his father. It was one of those things where it didn’t sum up his father’s wicked sense of humor, or his almost endless, unconditional adoration for Ben. Poe Dameron was with him at the funeral, and even as the fellow nine year old squeezed his hand, comforting him quietly, Ben could only hope that his father was smiling down at him from heaven, at least somewhere. 

There had to be a heaven, right?

***

When Alexander Snoke entered Ben and Leia’s life, Ben was eleven. There was something about him that was almost comforting to Ben; there he’d actually have some semblance of a father figure. His mother did her best, of course, but Ben did miss his father. His easy laugh, the way he’d carry Ben on his shoulders, the way he’d act out stories to Ben at bedtime. “Daddy”, for Ben, had become almost synonymous with the word “safety”. Snoke seemed to suit that idea too, though he was still a new addition to Leia and Ben’s life. 

“Just be careful around him, kiddo,” Uncle Chewie said, one time when Ben was visiting him at his garage. “I just...” He sighed. “I could just be paranoid, but I don’t trust him.”

Ben shrugged. “I like him,” he said. “He’s nice.”

”Like I said, I could just be paranoid.”

“Very,” Ben said lightly. 

Of course, he had to leave. He hoped, really, that Snoke didn’t hear anything that Uncle Chewie had said. After all, he liked them both, and somehow, he wanted them to get along.

***

Ben was thirteen when Snoke actually hurt his mother for the first time. 

They’d had their fights. Ben knew that much. Ben wasn’t oblivious. Fights that usually ended in Snoke all but storming away — fights that Ben knew that he didn’t want to make worse. But he’d mostly brushed it off (as had his mother) as Snoke having a rough moment. He had quite a few of them. He’d had a bit of a rough upbringing, Ben knew that. An orphan who’d been in and out of foster homes, some of them not so nice. (“The world has teeth, child,” Snoke said to him once, when he was twelve and watching an old movie together — Snoke was trying to get Ben introduced to them. “And sometimes they can bite so hard it bleeds.”) Of course he was going to have some rough moments. It wasn’t like Snoke had a serious mean streak. 

He hadn’t expected Snoke to actually slap his mother. 

Judging by the look on her face, the look of anger and more than that, hurt betrayal, Leia clearly hadn’t expected it either. 

Snoke...he looked shocked too. (Looking back on that moment, Ben couldn’t say whether he was genuine about it or if he was just a really good actor) “Leia,” he said, gently, “I don’t know what I was thinking...”

And even staring at the scene, from by the fireplace where he was doing his homework, Ben couldn’t help but feel himself reeling. You weren’t supposed to hit people. Especially not women. It was just...wrong. 

It shouldn’t have been that way. Even after they’d made up. Even after Snoke apologized for scaring Ben. Ben lay awake that night, phone lying beside him — Mom had gotten him that when he was eleven, figuring that he was old enough. He wished that Dad was alive again. Even though it was awful. Even though it was unfair. 

And even as things slowly began to get worse, as Snoke got angrier, it only served to be more truthful. 


End file.
